1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to artificial diets for honey bees. More particularly, the invention is directed to artificial diets and diet formulations which provide honey bees with a fully nutritious, easily digestible, complex mixture of proteins, carbohydrates, fats, minerals, and vitamins. The artificial diets of the invention sustain brood rearing and make possible the continuous rearing of bees.
2. Description of the Art
Honey bees are necessary to pollinate important agricultural crops and also to produce honey and wax for commercial markets. In the United States, honey bees produce $270 million worth of honey, beeswax, and other hive products and pollinate over $14 billion worth of crops annually.
Honey bees need a complex mixture of proteins, carbohydrates, fats, minerals, and vitamins to maintain normal growth and development. Typically, honey bees are able to acquire all of their dietary needs from available flowers or stored resources in the hive. Under normal circumstances, bees are able to forage and store enough pollen and honey to provide for their nutritional needs throughout the year. However, movement of hives create circumstances wherein normal foraging and/or stored resources are not adequate to provide bees with needed nutrition.
In the United States, 2-2.5 million hives are moved annually to provide commercial crop pollination. Migratory beekeeping places unusual stresses on the bees to the point that their stored pollen and honey resources diminish, and the nutritional state of the colony ultimately shuts down brood rearing due to a lack of available protein and nutrients. In addition, when hives are moved to a new site, there may be inadequate natural food sources at the new location and supplemental feed is required to maintain hive vigor.
Since the mid 1930s, work on artificial diets for honey bees as a replacement for pollen has been carried out. Currently known artificial diets for honey bees include liquid artificial nectars which comprise a carbohydrate or sugar source, pollen patties made of pollen and sugars, patties made of soy protein (usually solvent extracted) mixed with brewers yeast and sugar, patties made from a mixture of soy flour, Torula or brewers yeast, pollard, vegetable oil, vitamin mix and irradiated honey or malt, patties made from a mixture of Expeller press soy flour, pollard, cotton seed oil, vitamin mix and irradiated honey or malt, and Haydak diet patties made of soy meal, brewers yeast, sugar, and powered skim milk. A drawback of known artificial diets for honey bees is that they do not sustain brood rearing and thus are not suitable for the continuous rearing of bees.
Artificial diets for rearing entomophages and arthropods have been have been reported. U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,834,177 and 5,945,271 to Cohen describe a fresh and freeze-dried product, respectively, which comprise a mixture of (a) cooked whole egg, (b) a protein-lipid paste, and (c) a liquid, wherein the cooked whole egg forms a sticky, stringy substrate that retains nutrients in the protein-lipid paste in stable form. U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,235,528 and 6,506,597 to Cohen describe (1) an artificial growth medium composed of a mixture of cooked egg, liquid, and carbohydrate source, suitable for rearing zoophagous arthropods; (2) an artificial growth medium composed of a plant-based diet which includes cooked egg yolk or cooked whole egg, suitable for rearing phytophagous arthropods, including facultatively zoophagous phytophages, and (3) an artificial growth medium which includes the diet of (1) in combination with a plant-based diet which includes cooked egg yolk or cooked whole egg, which diet is suitable for rearing phytophagous arthropods, including facultatively zoophagous phytophages.
What is needed by the bee keepers and bee industry are artificial diets for honey bees that sustain brood rearing, maintain hive vigor, and maintain bee growth and development.